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Osho on How is God found?

How is God found?

God is found not in the mind's conjectures, but in the heart's flowering through love; religion is the awakening of direct experience, not mere definitions.

— Osho
According to Osho, God is not discovered by philosophy, logic, or inference—these are conjectures that scratch the itch of the mind. God is an immediate, lived vision accessed through the flowering of the heart, through love. Religion is experiential awakening, not definitions. When imagination and practices are transcended, a direct music of being is heard: the supreme experience.

You don’t find God by thinking hard; you meet God by opening your heart in love, like tasting honey instead of reading its recipe.

In His Own Words

From the Discourses

Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.

Birhani Mandir Diyana Baar · Discourse 6
Hindi · English translation

Osho, you said... then you will find that the devotee is God. The question arises: if one devotee prefers to be God and another wants to remain only a devotee, then which of the two is superior?

The one who wants to be God will not be able to be. And the one who wants to remain a devotee will become God. The question of superior or inferior does not arise, because only one of the two will happen. The one who does not want to be will be. The one who wants to be will be deprived. That very wanting is of the ego. But the matter is a little delicate. Sometimes humility too belongs to the ego. Beware that your humility may not be of the ego. Perhaps you are saying, “No, I don’t want to be,” because you know that those who refuse are the ones who attain. Then you are clever. Then your humility is adulterous. Your humility is not pure, not sacred, not virginal—it is like a prostitute. The one who wants to be God, whose ego says, “I must become God,”…
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God is not known through logic, God is known through the eyes of love. God is not a conclusion of great argument, it is an insight. It is not the end product of thinking but an experience of feeling. And just as we have eyes to see the world without, hidden behind these two eyes is a third eye which can look inwards. It is a metaphor, it is not a physiological phenomenon. It is not that by dissecting the body you will find the third eye somewhere. It is a poetic way of saying that when we close our eyes and we stop looking outwards, a new insight arises in us which looks inwards. And only by looking inwards does one find God, because God is not there outside; God is your very potential, your very ground, your very being.
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I Am That · Discourse 2
1980-10-12 · Buddha Hall · English

Osho, what is god?

GOD is not a person. That is one of the greatest misunderstandings, and it has prevailed so long that it has become almost a fact. Even if a lie is repeated continuously for centuries it is bound to appear as if it is a truth. God is a presence, not a person. Hence all worshipping is sheer stupidity. Prayerfulness is needed, not prayer. There is nobody to pray to; there is no possibility of any dialogue between you and God. Dialogue is possible only between two persons, and God is not a person but a presence -- like beauty, like joy. God simply means godliness. It is because of this fact that Buddha denied the existence of God. He wanted to emphasize that God is a quality, an experience -- like love. You cannot talk to love, you can live it. You need not create temples of love, you need…
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Maha Geeta · Discourse 78
1977-01-28 · Pune · Hindi · English translation

Osho, what is the fundamental anguish of human life?

There is only one anguish: that a human being cannot become what he was born to be. There is only one anguish: that the seed remains a seed and does not bloom like a flower; that it cannot scatter its fragrance to the infinite winds; cannot converse with the moon and stars; cannot offer its colors to the sky; cannot be expressed. If the poem within the poet cannot be revealed—anguish. If the painter cannot paint—anguish. If the dancer cannot dance—if chains lie on his feet—anguish. Anguish means only this: that what we are meant to be—our innate nature and destiny—does not come to fruition, and we are forced to be something else. Then anguish is born. Then melancholy gathers over life. And all those countless people you see burdened with sorrow, living in a kind of hell—the reason is only this: each has come carrying the seed of becoming…
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Prem Panth Aiso Kathin · Discourse 15
1979-04-10 · Pune · Hindi · English translation

Osho, God does not appear to me anywhere. What should I do?

Anand! Open your eyes. You are trying to see with your eyes shut, trying to hear with your ears closed, with the doors of the heart barred—then it is impossible to see God. When the eye is open, there is light. The very opening of the eye is light. Keep the eye closed and even if not one but a thousand suns were to rise, there will still be darkness, a moonless night. But this is not only your mistake; it is almost everyone’s. When God does not appear, people conclude: perhaps there is no God—hence He is not seen. Rarely does someone wonder: perhaps my eyes are closed—hence I do not see. Those rare ones, sooner or later, become able to see the Divine. So the first and the last sutra is this: drop the search for God; learn the alchemy of opening your eyes. Eyes open in two…
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